Page 27 of Unrealistic Expectations

But that night, he’d just wanted to make her happy. And part of him didn’t want to turn tail and run once the postorgasm glow faded, so he hadn’t let things get that far with her. After that night, they’d continued to see each other—and had hard-launched their relationship on Instagram on the beach the night before.

And he’d made her come with his mouth, his hands, and a few of her highly advanced toys. But he hadn’t let her return the favor. No matter how much he wanted to. Every time he let himself stop to think about it, he would get hard thinking about the sounds she made and the way he could make her body arch in what almost looked like pain right before she came. He finally understood why people got into Tantra and why his grandma always said, “It’s better to give than to receive.”

Though Grams probably didn’t mean it in this context.

He felt like he was losing his mind, and he knew that it wasn’t sustainable. Jessica was growing more and more confused by his refusal to let her even give him a hand job, and he knew that she wouldn’t buy his explanation.

She would tell him that he needed to lean into the discomfort and confront his fears about what would happen if they had the sort of sex that led to them both crossing the finish line and he freaked out. But he couldn’t do that to her. Even though he would have viewed her as a conquest—a worthy one, but a conquest all the same—just a few months ago, she was more to him than that now.

—

“I can’t believe Abby talked me into doing this.” Jessica had hoped she wouldn’t have to do any publicity for her book. However, it was part of her contract.

She paced in the tiny storage room that the bookseller had put her in to sign stacks of book copies. Her gaze caught on the copy of the blown-up author photo that the store had used to publicize the event and sneered. The door opened behind her, and her heart leapt into her throat. She’d thought she had a few more minutes.

“It’s not a bad photo.” Her heartbeat stayed as fast as it was before when she heard the deep timbre of Galvin’s voice.

She turned and faced him. His smile made her glad that he was there. “It’s not. I just don’t want to do this.”

His grin faltered. “Stage fright?” He shook his head. “You have nothing to worry about.”

Oh, God. What if she had nothing to worry about because no one had shown up? “It’s empty out there, isn’t it?”

He stepped toward her and stopped her progress with his big hands gripping her upper arms. “It’s full. Every seat. But you don’t have anything to worry about, because you’re going to be great.”

“How do you know?” Jessica had always avoided public speaking. This was worse than the podcast, when she only had questions from one underqualified dating coach. Now there was a room full of people asking for advice. “If I wasn’t required to do this by my book contract, I would run out the back door.”

He didn’t smile at that. In fact, the lines between his eyebrows deepened. “You’re going to kill this. If the people out there don’t drink up your advice and put it into practice, they’re bonkers.”

“Is that your clinical diagnosis?” She felt her face taking the shape of a smile. Somehow his confidence in her took a weight off her shoulders.

“No, I just want you to relax and have fun.”

She shook her head. “This will not be fun. I promise you that.”

The bookstore’s event coordinator came in to retrieve her just as Galvin opened his mouth.

As he walked out to find his seat, he mouthed, You’ll do great.

Jessica took a deep breath and walked onto the dais. She immediately regretted not asking someone to join her as a conversation partner. She would rather be interviewed by a thousand TikTok dating coaches than talk about her book and try to give people the hard sell. But she could still feel the imprint of Galvin’s hands on her arms and the confidence that he had in her. She knew she shouldn’t be making comparisons, but she’d never felt as though Luke had her back to the same degree.

She launched into her elevator pitch of the book but stopped when someone in the crowd laughed. She found Galvin in the crowd, and he gave her a thumbs-up, which told her they were laughing with her, not at her.

After that, she relaxed, and her prepared speech went quickly. She was almost willing to do it again, when a man who had his arms crossed over his chest for the whole talk and had not laughed even once raised his hand to ask a question.

“Lady, what I don’t understand is why I have to put so much effort into impressing a female. It’s not like any of them cook or clean anymore. Plus, I’m only five foot eight, and women get bent out of shape about it when they meet me.”

He took a deep breath and Jessica started to answer. “Well, I—”

“And dating costs so much money. Why do I have to buy a female dinner when she probably won’t even slob my knob?”

Jessica wanted to tell him that not calling women “females” was probably a good start, but she didn’t want to make this more combative than it needed to be.

She’d started to gather her thoughts when the man continued. “And why would I listen to you instead of a man who’s successful with females?”

The last thing that Jessica expected was for Galvin to stand up and point his finger at the man. “Would you shut up?”

“Who the hell are you?”

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